Standards, guidance and curricula

From medical school to postgraduate education, we set the standards and expected outcomes for medical education and training in the UK. We regulate all stages of doctors' professional development, including training for qualified doctors who want to specialise.

How we quality assure

We’re responsible for assuring the quality of education and training. Our quality assurance framework is how we check the use of our standards and guidance.

Standards and outcomes

We set the standards expected of medical training organisations. We also set the outcomes students and doctors in training should achieve. Our five publications set out in detail what these standards and outcomes are.

Doctors must keep their knowledge and skills up to date throughout their working life and maintain and improve their performance. Continuing professional development is a key way to meet these professional standards.

Gateways to the professions provides suggestions to medical schools on ways to make courses more accessible to students with disabilities. The guidance does not lay down new requirements, quality assurance standards or ‘policies’ from us or any of the other organisations involved.

Position statements

Sometimes we are asked for help in interpreting our guidance. Our section on position statements looks at areas where we've been asked to provide more help. The latest five statements are listed below.

This statement is about how the safety of patients is at the core of our new standards for education and training. This includes the expectation that training should take place in an open and honest learning culture.

Guidance to postgraduate deaneries, medical royal colleges/faculties and trainees on the management of absences from training and their effect on a trainee’s certificate of completion of training (CCT) date.

Medical education projects

Medicine never stops changing and improving, so education and training must keep up. Our projects tackle any subject which may impact on education now and in the future. The latest five projects we've been working on are listed below.

Differential attainment is what we call the gap between attainment levels of different groups of doctors. It's an indicator that training and medical education may not be fair. Find out more about the work we are doing about this.

We are considering a new process called credentialing to recognise doctors’ capabilities in particular practice areas. The main purpose of this new framework will be to protect patients and make sure that future healthcare developments are safe and effective.

We help to protect patients and improve medical education and practice in the UK by setting standards for students and doctors. We support them in achieving and exceeding those standards, and take action when they are not met.